


Lost and Found

by ThirdGenerationRockette



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: 1.08, AU, Angst, F/M, S1, slightly drunk mac
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-13
Updated: 2018-02-13
Packaged: 2019-03-17 19:01:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13665294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThirdGenerationRockette/pseuds/ThirdGenerationRockette
Summary: Things between them haven't exactly been great lately, and he knows he's to blame, he knows choosing Brian to write the article is one of the shittiest stunts he's pulled, and he knows she's particularly hurt because she thought things between them were improving.





	Lost and Found

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this re-posting exercise has made me realise how much post-1.08 fic I've written...

"Mackenzie?" He picks up as soon as he sees her name on the screen, frowning at how late it is, not because she's disturbing him, but because he wonders if something is wrong.

Things between them haven't exactly been great lately, and he knows he's to blame, he knows choosing Brian to write the article is one of the shittiest stunts he's pulled, and he knows she's particularly hurt because she thought things between them were improving. She's right too, they had been improving, so much so that he plucked up the courage when he was high to leave her a message telling her what he hadn't had the balls to say up to that point. Her silence in response told him everything he needed to know, reminded him of what a fucking idiot he was for thinking for even a second that she might still feel something for him.

"Oh! Hi, Will," she says, a baffled tone to her voice as she goes on. "It's late, is everything okay?"

"Pretty sure that's my line considering you called me." He can hear traffic, horns honking, and it worries him. "Where are you?"

"I called _you_?" Her confusion becomes clear to him suddenly. She's been drinking, he can hear the slight fuzziness around her words, not to mention she hasn't called him this late since the day Brian arrived in the newsroom. "I didn't...oh, I was trying to open the map thing, and it guess I-"

"Where are you?" He repeats the question slowly, aware now that if he doesn't manage to get her to focus, he's never going to figure out where she's calling him from at midnight. All he knows is that she isn't at home, and she's more than likely alone.

"You know what, Billy? I don't really know. There's a very slight chance I could be a tiny bit lost right now." She sighs and his heart lurches at the sound of her calling him Billy in a voice filled with sadness. "I'm walking, I think I'm on, like, 6th Avenue, maybe 7th? I'm not sure."

"6th Avenue? Okay," he says, determined not to get frustrated with her. He knows how she is when she's been drinking, how her thoughts race a mile a minute in a thousand different directions, and the last thing he wants is for her to hang up. "Which direction are you walking in?"

"How am I meant to know that?" She sounds confused, and he detects a hint of impatience in her voice. "I barely know how to get fucking anywhere in this city other than from home to work. Oh, Manhattan's easy, everyone says, it's on a grid, you can't go wrong. Lies, big fat lies, I go wrong all the time, I just don't...oh, no, wait, I do know! I'm going uptown, I should turn around."

"You're going uptown?" He has no idea how she's reached that conclusion but she sounds unreasonably proud of herself. "You're sure?"

"Yes, I'm _sure_. I'm not an idiot, thank you very much." She huffs and he has to bite back a laugh at her indignant tone. "I know I'm going uptown because the _traffic_ is going uptown."

"The traffic is going uptown in relation to what, Mac?" He knows she hasn't thought this through, and it's obvious at this point that there's more than a slight chance she's lost.

"In relation to the traffic going downtown," she says, slowly, as though he's the idiot in this situation. "Pay attention, Will!"

"If you were thinking clearly, and by that I mean if you were sober, you'd realise that what you just said makes absolutely no sense." He keeps his tone level even though a large part of him wants to yell at her, to ask her why the fuck she didn't just get in a cab. "Would you do something for me?"

"I think that probably depends on what it is," she says, sounding so uncertain that he wonders what the hell she thinks he's about to ask. "It's late, I really should get home, and I don't know if I- "

"Mackenzie, listen to me, just for a second." She falls silent and he goes on quickly, before she starts talking again. "It's almost midnight, you've had a few drinks, and you don't seem to have any real idea of where you are, right?"

"See, I wasn't at all worried until you just said that..." She sighs loudly down the phone, her frustration clear. "Alright, what do you want me to do for you?"

"I want you to stay on the phone with me, and keep walking, but I want you to stop when you reach the end of the block." He stands up from the couch and heads into his bedroom, grabbing a pair of jeans and moving back into the living room.

"Is this a game? Is there a prize at the end of the block?" she asks, the anticipation in her question, the assumption that they may actually be playing some sort of game, reminding him again that she's obviously had way more to drink than she usually would. "Is it pizza?"

"Maybe, let's see what happens when you get there, okay?" It's easier to indulge her at this point, he knows her well enough to have walked this conversation route before.

"Okay." She goes quiet and if he wasn't listening so intently to her soft breathing, he'd be worried she'd hung up. "Ooh, I can see the corner, I'm almost there."

"Good. When you get there, all you need to do is look up at the street signs and tell me where the fuck you are." He knows he sounds terse, he always does when he's worried, he can't ever conceal it.

"Alright, jeez, there's no need to get snippy with me." He can hear traffic again and voices, so at least wherever she's not in some deserted alley. "I'm at...6th and White, outside a building with a nice clock. See, I said I was on 6th, I knew it!"

"6th and White? Then there's no way you were walking uptown, Mac." The realisation that she's further downtown than she ever usually ventures is accompanied by another thought. "Wait, hang on, did you walk from Hang Chews?”

"I don't know, I suppose I must have, yeah." He can almost hear her shrug down the phone, even though he knows that's not possible. "Why? Would that be really far?"

"Yeah, it would be," he says, as he thinks about how far she may have just walked and wonders again why she didn't stop to try to figure out where she was way before now. "Holy fuck."

"Well, I'm wearing really expensive shoes, and I'm fine, so they were obviously worth every penny." She sounds so pleased with herself that he can't help smiling. Knowing where she is finally is helping too. "Anyway, what now?”

"You seem to have managed to walk half the length of Manhattan, and now you're...you're barely a few blocks from my apartment." He shakes his head as he tries to pull his jeans on using only one hand, failing and putting the phone on speaker as long as it takes for him to dress.

"Oh, that's nice!" Her reaction suggests genuine excitement, further proof of her distance from being sober, considering how things have been recently. "You should lean out of your window and wave to me, Will!"

"Jesus..." He mumbles and picks the phone back up from the table as he grabs his keys. "Stay right where you are, I'm coming down there. I mean it, do not move."

"There's no need to be so bossy, I'm standing right here, completely still, I'm not moving at all." He can picture the expression on her face right now, it's the one that says 'please don't think you're in charge here', the same one he sees several times a week during their broadcasts. "Are you coming to find me in your PJs?"

"As entertaining as that may sound to you right now, sadly not." He slams the door behind him and heads for the elevator.

He finds her, thankfully exactly where she said she was, leaning against a wall on the corner of White Street, and she bites her lip when she spots him approaching. It's not until he reaches her that he fully appreciates how sad she looks, the smile she gives him going nowhere close to reaching her eyes.

"Hey," she says, shrugging and pulling herself away from the wall. "I'm sorry you had to come down here just to point me in the right direction. I'm sure I could've figured it out from the map eventually...actually, I've probably walked enough already, I should just find a cab, you really don't need to-"

"Come inside." He stops her, smiling softly as she babbles in her endearingly drunken way. "I'll get you some water, something to eat...I can call a car for you."

"Really?" She frowns, screws up her nose. "You can just pick up the phone and have them send a car whenever you like. I mean, literally, at any time of the day or not? That's kind of...indulgent, don't you think?"

"Perk of the job." He grins at her and she shrugs again, apparently making a decision. "Alright, some water would be good, I think..." she says, with a small smile. "Thanks."

*

It's warm out, despite being after midnight, and he's wearing just a t-shirt, mostly because he didn't even think about stopping to grab anything other than his keys when he realised where she was. She's wearing what she wore to work today, with the addition of a jacket over her arm, which makes him smile. He's spent many an hour listening to her rants about the failure of most establishments to figure out a setting for their a/c that doesn't just assume the only alternative to baking hot is freezing cold, and he'd have been more surprised if she _didn't_ have her jacket.

She follows him back to his apartment in silence, a sheepish look on her face whenever he risks a glance in her direction. When they step into the elevator she leans down and removes her shoes, letting out a long breath as she waggles her toes and he notices the dark pink polish.

"Do you like my toes?" she asks suddenly, grinning at him. "The colour, I mean. Of my nails, not my toes. My toes are just toe coloured, but my nails...well, I like them."

"I like them too." He smiles at her and it takes an almost superhuman strength not to call her honey as he watches her pull her bottom lip between her teeth, wobbling slightly against the back of the elevator despite being barefoot with no heels to blame her unsteadiness on.

When they reach his apartment, he stands aside to let her step out first and he can't quite resist placing a hand gently on the small of her back, telling himself he's just steadying her, nothing more.

"Sit down, I'll grab some water." He steers her towards the couch as he heads into the kitchen and fills a large glass for her, before heading out to where she's sitting. "Did you eat? I don't know what I have but I'm sure I can throw something together."

"I ate," she says, taking several big gulps from the glass. "I think I ate. Either way, I'm not hungry."

"Is there a reason you're pretty smashed right now?" He knows he's taking a risk with his question, because he's pretty sure he's to blame, and drunk Mackenzie won't shy from the truth.

"I'm hardly _smashed_ , and that isn't why I got lost, I got lost because...well, I don't know my fucking way anywhere, that's why." She frowns at him and pauses again to take another drink before she puts the glass carefully down on the table in front of her. "I had six Martinis so I'm pretty sure that's the reason...oh, maybe I didn't eat. I don't know. Anyway, yeah, I think the six Martinis are to blame."

"Yeah, I get that, but...is there a reason you felt the need to drink six Martinis tonight?" She looks sad again, the look in her eyes the same as the one he noticed out on the street.

"I just didn't want to go home after the show and be alone, I guess," she says, giving him a weak smile. "So I thought maybe a few drinks might help. On reflection, I walked a million blocks and ended up dragging you out to find me, so I don't think it worked out too well at all."

"Where was Sloan? Did she leave before you?" he asks, doubting that Sloan would have left her if she'd already been six drinks down.

"I wasn't out with Sloan." She leans her head back against the couch and his eyes drift absently to the curve of her neck, to the necklace she rarely goes without, and when she sighs heavily he looks away. "I wasn't out with anyone, I just found a corner, sat in it, and started drinking. God, that's pathetic, isn't it? Actually, no, don't answer that."

"Wouldn't dream of it," he says, quietly, thinking it's no worse than drinking alone at home every night, a pastime he's more than familiar with.

"I'm going to say something, and I want you to just let me get it all out, okay?" A feeling of foreboding runs through him, but he invited her up here, she's just confessed to spending the night drinking alone at a bar, so if she has something to say, he has to let her say it.

"I'm tired. I'm just...tired. I try every day, and I just seem to keep hurting you, and I hate it, I don't want to hurt you, I don't do it intentionally, I've _never_ done it intentionally, and I don't want you to hate me anymore, but I don't know how to fix it." She pauses and he can feel her eyes on him but he absolutely can't being himself to meet her gaze. "I don't know how to make you see I'm sorry for everything, that I wish it was six years ago, and if I could turn back the clock I never would have done what I did, and we'd still be as happy as we were then, maybe even happier. I know you brought Brian in to hurt me, and I understand that, it's what I deserve, I know that, and it's okay. I can deal with it. I put up with worse from him for a lot longer, so if I just don't think about that, it's fine, and I-"

"What do you mean?" Something in his gut lurches at her words, at the expression on her face, the look that tells him he knows nothing, that all the assumptions he's been making for years are quite possibly way off the mark.

"Look, the thing is, I can leave, you know." She continues and he does look at her now and she looks...stricken is the word that springs to mind, and he can't think of a single suitable response. "I mean, I don't want to leave, I love my job, and I love our show, or, well, I did until a few weeks ago...anyway, if looking at me every day just makes you feel like you want to vomit then I can leave, I can go, I mean it isn't like I'm attached to New York, I can't even find my fucking way home. I think what I'm saying is-"

"I'm pretty sure nobody in the world could ever look at you and want to vomit, but I appreciate the sentiment. And no, I don't want you to leave." He stops her, scared of where she was heading, and hoping his tone is as firm as he intends it to be as he realises he couldn't really blame her if she wanted to go after the way he's treated her. "What did you mean, you put up with worse from Brenner? I figured he must have been a fucking prince to keep you running back for more."

"Oh yeah, a real prince among men, a total catch." She lets out a bitter laugh, without a trace of humour. "Never happy unless I was miserable."

"Then what the fuck kept you going back?" He doesn't mean to snap, but he's angry suddenly, and confused all over again. "What did I do wrong that made _that_ option seem so tempting?"

"Nothing! You did nothing wrong, Billy, I swear!" She shifts slightly, turning to face him, and for a second her hand hovers over his before she pulls it back. "You did everything right, you were perfect, you loved me, you treated me like I was so special and I...I panicked, I think. I couldn't understand how someone like you could want someone like me, and at first I wanted to make him jealous, and then I realised I didn't care what he thought, I didn't care about him at all, I just wanted you."

"You panicked?" He manages nothing more, stunned by the fact that she could ever have questioned why he wanted her, when he had spent so long wondering the same thing.

"Yeah, I just...I don't know how I ended up so good at my job but so bad at my _life_." She stops and stands up, abruptly, definitively, a patented Mackenzie move telling him this conversation is over. "Alright, I don't want to...I'm going to use the bathroom, and I think maybe you should call that car for me now."

He calls the car through a fog of confusion. She never thought she deserved him, and his first instinct is that it makes no sense because she's smart, and beautiful, and he couldn't take his eyes off her from the minute she walked through his office door. Then his mind replays her words about Brian, the catch in her voice when she said she had put up with worse from him, and he recognises a tiny part of himself in her tone. The tiny voice that tells you you're not good enough, you don't deserve any better, the constant repetition that finally works its way inside your head until you can't remember when you didn't think that about yourself. He glances up as she walks back in, her hair obviously combed, her shoes and jacket back on, and he wants nothing more than to be able to cross the room and take her in his arms, but his feet and brain seem to be conspiring against his heart and he can't move. She watches him, her eyes still sad, tired, and a resigned half-smile on her lips. There are words forming on his tongue, kinder words than he's said to her lately, and he's about to set them free when his phone bleeps loudly and startles them both, the moment lost.

"Car's here," he says, dropping the phone clumsily back down onto the table.

"Thanks, you don't need to..." She trails off, and he takes her words to mean she doesn't want him to accompany her downstairs, which he was about to offer to do. "I'll be fine. Thank you...for the water, the car, you know."

"You're welcome." He nods at her, watching as she walks towards the door, pausing for an instant to squeeze his arm as she passes, before she's gone, the door clicking softly shut behind her.

He debates pouring himself a scotch but decides trying to sleep is probably the better idea, so he heads for the bedroom, kicking off his shoes on the way. When his phone bleeps again, he knows before looking that it's her, and he opens the message on the screen.

_'Sorry I ended up calling you, thanks for the rescue...water, car, etc. God, this would all be much easier if I didn't love you so much- M, xx'_

*

Despite it having been almost one in the morning before she left his apartment, he knows Mackenzie will be in the office already when he gets in, just as she always is. As he sits in the back of the car, he can picture her so clearly; checking her emails, the morning papers spread across her desk, empty mug in front of her, and a faint frown of concentration on her face as she pushes her glasses back up her nose. He asks the driver to let him out at a Starbucks a block from the office, thinking he could use the walk to wake him up and he can pick up an extra coffee for her, two birds with one stone, as it were. To say he slept badly wouldn't even start to cover it, he isn't sure he actually slept at all. He didn't reply to her message because...well, what the fuck could he have said in response?

Of course he still loves her, he never stopped, but when he told her as much the night he was high, she not only failed to respond to his message, she never mentioned it at all. In his mind, the only logical explanation was that she didn't feel the same way, and he reacted by bringing Brian in to write the story when a thousand other writers could have done it. He hates that his automatic reaction to what he saw as yet another rejection was to hurt her all over again, and he feels a sharp stab of guilt as he thinks of what she said about Brian last night. Guilt that multiplies when he looks at her message again as he stands in line to order coffee. Between Starbucks and the office, he has to decide what to say to her, and because he's an angry, reactive asshole, how to apologise.

Dropping in to his own office, he hangs up his jacket and leaves his coffee on the desk, nodding a good morning to Maggie as he heads out to find Mackenzie. Her door is open and he sees Brian first, standing in front of her desk, a sneer on his face, and it's only when he gets closer that he sees her, her arms wrapped defensively around herself, her eyes cast downward, the same body language he's been choosing to ignore ever since Brian arrived.

"You know what, Mac, you can sit there and tell me what _you'd_ prefer I write..." As he reaches the door, he hears Brian's voice, his tone dripping with a smug coldness. "But when it comes right down to it, Will has the final say, and if you come out of this looking like exactly what you are, then it's really not my problem."

"Is that so?" Mackenzie's tone is sharp, brittle, and her eyes dart up to meet Brian's, obvious anger in her gaze. "And what _am_ I exactly?"

"Peabody award winning journalist, and the best EP this show has ever fucking had." He can't hold back a second more, instead pushing his way into the office and setting her coffee down in front of her before turning to Brian. "I'm sure you're well aware of Mackenzie's long list of accomplishments, and I can only assume that's what you're referring to."

"Will?" She sounds confused, and when he glances back at her, she must see something in his eyes because she stands up and walks slowly around the desk.

"Yeah, I know what her Wikipedia page says," Brian says with a dismissive shrug. "But I think we all know this story isn't about her professional accomplishments, I know damn well that's not why _I'm_ the one you wanted to write this story, Will, and so do you."

"Ask her again what you asked her the other day." Something in him snaps at Brian's tone, and suddenly everything becomes clear, like he's been living under a fog for years that's finally lifting.

"What?" Brian shakes his head, looking at him like he's lost his mind, and Mackenzie bites her lip and waits for him to clarify.

"The other day, right before we threw out the rundown and I told you to just write the truth, you asked Mackenzie if I came back." He doesn't even know if Brian will remember, and he definitely won't have realised he was overheard, but it's suddenly vital that he repeats his question. "Ask her again."

"What the fuck?" Brian sighs and in that instant it's clear he knows exactly what he's referring to.

"You _heard_ that?" Mackenzie asks, and he sees her slump slightly, leaning back against the desk. He realises she thinks he's playing games to embarrass her, humiliate her, and he nods in her direction, silently willing her to just trust him.

"Ask. Her. Again. Asshole." He takes a step closer, using his height advantage quietly but effectively over Brian.

"I don't know what the fuck game you're playing here." Brian tries at first to sound like he's in control, but backs down almost instantly, turning slightly to look at Mac. "Fine, whatever. Did Will come back?"

"That's the one." He speaks before Mackenzie can say a thing, and he smiles at the baffled look on her face before he continues. "Yeah, he fucking did."

He finds himself all but shoving Brian out of the way, thinking about nothing other than getting to Mackenzie, whose eyes are wide as she stares at him, a faint flush creeping into her cheeks.

"Get out, Brenner. In case you hadn't figured it out, you're off the story, you're done." He's talking to Brian but his eyes never leave Mackenzie's, watching as something approaching realisation dawns on her face. "Get the fuck out."

He hears Brian huff in protest, but he doesn't care about him, or about the damn story. All he cares about is Mackenzie standing in front of him, and the tiny gasp of surprise she lets out when he gently cups her face and smiles at her.

"I'm not sure I understand what's..." She stops and covers his hand with hers as he runs his thumb across her cheekbone, and she does smile then. A tiny, slightly anxious half-smile that starts to loosen the knot in his stomach. "Wait, you just said-"

"The other day I heard him ask you if I came back, and you said 'I don't know yet'," he says, his mind flashing back to the look of defiance on her face as she threw her answer back at Brian. "And I guess I'm trying to say that if you still want me, and fuck, I hope you do, then yeah, I'm back. I love you...I just do, I love you, Mackenzie, I always have, I can't stop, I don't _want_ to stop, and after you sent that message last night, I lay awake and all I could think about was what an ass I'd been. Bringing Brian in, punishing you over and over, and I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry, I-"

"I didn't sleep last night either, because by that time the alcohol had long worn off and all I could think about was what an idiot I was for sending that message, and then when you didn't reply I figured I'd ruined everything." She bites her lip as he steps closer and his hand moves instinctively to her waist, resting on the soft satin of her shirt. "I haven't ruined everything, have I?"

"Honey, you haven't ruined _anything_." He smiles and she returns it, this time without a trace of anxiety or uncertainty. "You gave me an ass kicking with that message, that's what you did. I've been such a fucking idiot, all this time, I-"

"None of that matters now," she says, her smile growing wider. "At least not to me, so-"

"I love you," he says again, suddenly needing to repeat it with no real idea why, other than he missed being able to tell her.

"I got that." Her smile is now a beam, and she moves a hand to his chest, her fingers gripping his t-shirt as though she's convincing herself he's really standing in front of her.

"And I'm sorry." Almost more important than telling her he loves her is making sure she knows how much he regrets the way he's treated her. "I'm sorry."

"I got that too." Leaning in, her face is so close to his that he can feel her breath on his cheek and he feels his own smile matching hers. "Billy?"

"Yeah?" He manages barely a whisper, mesmerised by how close she is, by the look in her eyes as she gazes into his.

"I love you too," she says, her voice quiet but her tone leaving no room for doubt.

They're in her office, the door is open, their staff are all working just feet away and he knows they will have seen Brian stride across the newsroom, and they may have heard him being told to get the fuck out. Right now though, he doesn't care who can see them, he wouldn't care if they were standing in the middle of Times Square, because there's only one thing he wants to do, _needs_ to do. Closing the distance between them, he presses his lips softly against hers and kisses her. At last.


End file.
